Annexe for 23yr old daughter with Autism

[MRST2B]

Hi..I'm completely new to this but hoping someone might be able to offer some help or advice. We have a 23 yr old daughter with Autism & mild/moderate LD. She has been served notice at her care home and we are looking to move to a house with an annexe, where we hope she can live as independently as possible with a 24/7 care package.

Does anyone have any experience of this kind of arrangement?

How does the local authority assess her contibution to care costs?

What is a realistic amount to allow for living costs ?

Does anyone have any experience of community DOLS?

Is it best to apply for Deputyship automatically (can't do LPA as she doesn't have capacity) or only if we have any issues?

Can she/we apply for any grants for any alterations we need to make to ensure it meets her needs?

There's probably 101 things we haven't thought of, so any advice would be gratefully received.

[SpeedyH]

I don’t have experience of this, but have a couple of comments to contribute:

Adult social care departments vary immensely around the country so it is a bit of a postcode lottery what they will fund and how much your daughter would have to contribute. The Care Act which covers these things gives Social Care departments a lot of discretion and some are more generous.

The basic tenet seems to be that your daughters needs must be met in the most cost effective way. So, if a certain need is identified that can be met in a way that is cheaper than what you propose, then they can insist on that. In these circumstances you would have to provide evidence that the two are not equitable in meeting her needs and why she needs what you are proposing. If she has been successfully living in a Care home and if it is cheaper than 24/7 Care in her own home, then you might struggle to get funding.

It is not possible for your daughter to claim housing benefit if she is living with a relative so you would need to check this out with regards to whether this applies to an annex.

Your local social care department will have their own charging policy so perhaps google this or ask them for a copy. It is a complicated calculation but basically they add up your daughters income, so typically esa and pip. From this amount they subtract the amount a single person needs to live on - this is called the minimum income guarantee and is set by government, it is about £120 a week I think - and also any regular disability related expenditure you can prove your daughter has (for example, extra laundry costs due to continence, extra energy consumption, podiatry costs etc). The amount that is left after offsetting these costs is the amount she has to pay over for her care.

Each local authority has to offer grants for essential works to make a home accessible for a disabled person. These are called Disabled Facility Grants. Again, google this for your area as it is different in each. They tend to be hard to get and means tested.

I think you would be unlikely to get deputyship from the court of protection if your daughter has a mild/moderate leaning disability. Health and welfare deputyships are particularly hard to get. It is important to remember that the ‘capacity’ that your daughter needs in order to set up a lasting power of attorney is only the capacity to understand in simple terms what the document is for and to agree to you having the power to help her make decisions. The test is not whether she has capacity to make specific decisions in her life, like being able to manage a mortgage or whatever. A skilled and experienced solicitor would be able to explain the LPA to her and assess whether she meets the test for ‘mental capacity’ to agree to it.

Lots of organisations like Mencap, the challenging behaviour foundation, Down’s syndrome association and so on have useful documents on their website about housing options.

Hope this helps

[MRST2B in reply to SpeedyH]

Thanks for the info SpeedyH👍

[Jac_789]

My daughter lived in our annex for several years. We were able to get housing benefit for her. You have to have a tenancy agreement (get one from the internet), it has to be self contained(ours had separate elect gas meters). We also got the annex separated from the house for council tax purposes - which brings down the class of the main house's council tax and of course the annex is free due to severe mental impairment reduction

[MRST2B in reply to Jac_789]

Thanks for your reply. Will have to look into the council tax aspect. 🤨

[BenjiB]

This is something we’ve thought about doing for our son. The sister of a friend has recently bought a house for her two boys. The LA pay her rent for the house and she’s had to set up her own care agency for staff. It’s all quite involved. I don’t know all the ins and outs. Ultimately though the boys are left with £130 a week between them to pay for everything. My own son has one year left at his residential college and then we need to have something in place for him. It’s all quite overwhelming!

[Sarah_Mencap]

Hello

This sounds like a great solution, but there must be a lot to think about.

Our Learning Disability Helpline may be able to help - please do give them a call on 0808 808 1111 and have a chat with one of our trained advisors.

There are some great replies here too - I hope they help.

Best of luck

Sarah

[Kieran_Mencap]

Hellothank you for getting in touch.

I also suggest you contact the helpline. The line is now closed but we are opened again tomorrow.

We take calls between 10am - 3pm.

You could also contact us online mencap.org.uk/contact/conta...

I hope this helps

Kieran